A Life is Fragile; The Life is Robust
1000 ways to die
Living organisms can perish in the weirdest and stupidly subtle ways. If any organ fails it can die. If it gets sick it can die. If it gets cut it might die. Poison? Die. Too old? Dead. Lack of food and water: same story. Any little thing going wrong within the complex system can lead to death. This is not a bad thing. In fact this is how it seems to work by design on purpose.
Many people seem to believe that it should not work this way: That suffering, pain, and death should be mitigated at all costs. After all: none of us want to experience these things. Billionaires are running around trying to live forever and I'm not sure whether I'm impressed or embarrassed about everything going on during these crazy times.
Is it really a good idea for a bunch of old farts to never die and be in control of everything until the end of time? That sounds like a tragedy of epic proportions. Or maybe it's all just part of the journey of sentient intelligent life. Perhaps there is some kind of valid evolutionary path that involves immortality, even if a billion years of evolution is telling us otherwise.
It's also quite odd just how resilient life can be in certain situations. I listened to this podcast about Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, a tale of survival, perseverance, and cannibalism. One of the survivors (after 72 days without food in freezing sub-zero temperatures) had a completely fractured skull from the initial plane crash. Not only that: he played a main-character role in the story and was directly responsible for the group's survival. Quite a crazy story, that.
Circle of life
While a life is fragile and can die for any reason, life itself as a whole is robust and basically can't be killed. Even if humanity's primary goal was to eradicate all life on the planet I honestly don't think we'd be up to the task. Even nuking the surface of Earth isn't really going to kill Gaia. Hell, it might even be a small setback in the grand scheme of things. Truly we know a lot less than we pretend to in terms of how this all works.
Life is decentralized
The reason why life is such a robust system is because it is inherently decentralized. Centralized systems can topple over from environmental change. A gust of wind blows over a house made of straw. Life adapts to change through the evolutionary process. Genetics are decentralized; Sexual reproduction is decentralized. Evolution is decentralized. The atomic family and tribes are decentralized. Earth's resources are distributed and decentralized. Even the weather itself is implicitly decentralized.
So what is the disadvantage of all this decentralization?
It's not all sunshine and rainbows! Being in crypto so long we already know the drawbacks of decentralization. Decentralization is quite inefficient and has trouble scaling. Decentralization is slow and creeping and takes a long time to get anything significant completed. In return for this inefficiency we are granted with security and robustness.
Luckily the boundaries are contained by access to resources.
While life itself is quite inefficient and slow, it can also expand exponentially given the right environment. Life does not have to be efficient in many respects because it has access to infinite energy by way of the sun. The sun's rays never stop shining, and plants are able to harvest that energy into something more useful for us meatbags. What a miracle that is! Or perhaps just all part of the plan.
If there are enough resources in an area (food/water/shelter) then life is guaranteed to explode exponentially within that area until those resources are depleted and must reach equilibrium. This can be a quite jarring process, and once again we see the parallels to crypto given the boom and bust cycles we see every 4 years.
What can crypto and digital expansion learn from all this?
There are a lot of similarities here we can draw conclusions from. While others look at things like the Dot Com bubble to make comparisons, and that seems like a good idea on paper, a centralized expansion is not comparable to a decentralized expansion.
Does crypto exist in a good environment for exponential expansion?
This is a pretty moot point considering the exponential expansion has been happening this entire time and only slows down during relatively small equilibrium pullbacks. The macro side still clearly shows exponential expansion, so thus we have to assume that this environment is quite good for crypto. Again, this makes sense, as the main product of crypto is one of trust, trustlessness, and self-sovereignty. When we look at the world it's quite obvious that the product and usecase is one of the most necessary and rare resources throughout a continually consolidated society.
Many think that USA and other governments cracking down on crypto makes this a bad environment, when exactly the opposite is true. We've already seen that without any pushback or resistance from the establishment that crypto loses all decentralization and turns into a centralized hunk of scam tokens. These projects are supposed to be purged through their own failures combined with the attacks coming from the current paradigm. It's all working as it should be, but many think otherwise because they are greedy, impatient, and ironically part of the problem.
Conclusion
Decentralization is a spectrum. A single living entity is quite centralized and efficient in many respects, while many of those same living entities competing for resources within a hostile environment lead to a complex decentralized meta. Crypto is quite akin to all of this, with the decentralized code and infrastructure trickling down into more and more centralized systems. The centralized systems are always more vulnerable (but also more efficient) than the more decentralized systems they are built atop.
We could learn a lot from a billion years worth of evolution rather than trying to compare this movement to events that have nothing to do with decentralization (like Dot Com and the stock market). It's easy to get sidetracked. Keep learning and keep stacking.
It is definitely not good for anyone for a bunch of super old rich meatbags to never die and never cede control of everything... especially since the reality for their peers is a downtrend in life expectancy...
If the US comes down hard on crypto, it hurts the US way more than it hurts crypto. I'm sure Ripple regrets not moving to Singapore (may not have made much difference) when they were thinking about it. I'm sure Portugal has seen an influx in companies making Lisbon their base of operations since they made their 'crypto is free from tax' ruling.
Life will become more miserable If there happens to be a vaccine meant to give immortality...
This will give more power to the billionaires amongst us. It is like the alchemy of souls. Their presence will wipe off human race.
What if I invent the immortality vaccine, and not the Gates Foundation? What if I give it away to everyone that builds a spaceship and colonizes some other place in space? What if I charge 100% of the assets of anyone I sell it to? I reckon the billionaire's hands are a lot weaker than they appear in the mirror.
If you can do that, just maybe... Just the slightest maybe, there could be life for the masses.
But you can't do it alone. You need people who understand and accept the need to do it.
My real point is that billionaires actually have a pathetic shot at immortality. Death evolved early, and it is so advantageous to species by enabling evolution to quickly respond to changing environments that there are literally dozens of mechanisms that senesce and limit lifespans. Not one of the billionaires I am aware of actually researches themselves in this field. I'm sure all of them do what Epstein did, and throw money at researchers in the hope they'll get some edge in life extension first that they can capitalize on.
Peter Thiel famously buys young blood and transfuses it, and I'm sure many billionaires do the same. But that also shows that even the most alarming technology they employ to extend their lives isn't covert. Their employees doing the research will not enable them to hoard any development that they can use to extend their lives, or none of us would know of the macabre practice of parasitizing youthful blood, because it's so alarming and strongly suggests they're comparable to vampires or Elizabeth Bathory, willing to stoop to any unethical mechanism in the pursuit of youth and longer life.
If significant advance occurs in gerontology, we'll all know it almost immediately. No silver bullet is potential, like a vaccine, because of the complexity of the mechanisms causing senescence.
The first 3D printed spaceship just launched in March. There are few technologies advancing as fast and dispersing as widely as 3D printing. I predict it will be decades, at most, before individual households can print their own spaceships in their own garages. Once we can do that, and use aquaponics to sustain ourselves in any environment, and use the wide variety of means of producing power, there just isn't a way for overlords to oppress us.
Illimitable resources are just waiting for us in space, where no armies can follow, and no overlord project force. We will create inconceivable wealth in absolute freedom, and nothing can stop us. The laws of physics determine what technology can exist, and decentralization of the means of production are the cutting edge of technological advance because that's what the laws of physics mandate. Even if we are bombed back into the Stone Age, we'll just get here again.
I don't need to make people understand all this. I need to understand all this in order to enable my sons to make it happen, but there will be people that make it happen whether it's my sons or not. When it happens, we will begin a diaspora across the universe that will disperse people, isolate them, and diminish their ability to enjoy the blessings of civil society. Nothing will be more valuable going forward than good company, and it will only grow more valuable going forward.
I hope that is something we can all benefit from on Hive, despite the focus on tokens and financial manipulation we see ongoing. I consider money and tokens of negligible value, and seek to use goodwill, to employ goodwill as an economic mechanism, because that reflects the true value of society, and goodwill is the most valuable thing in the universe. You're absolutely right I can't do it alone, and I can't hoard it. Goodwill only grows when you give it away.
I do agree with the billionaires having a shot at immortality and we can see scientists who are crazy enough to continually find a cure to end mortal life and begin another race.
But, the scientists only need a rat to carry on the operation. They won't give out the cure to these pathetic people when the cure Is found.
Technology is indeed running a race and all we have to do is to learn not only to be a fast runner but also human.
The word "Stone Age" reminds me of Senku. He is the main character in the Anime I saw last year titled, Dr. Stone. I do believe humanity will learn to improve and move forward through advancing themselves if we are all hit by the wave of the Stone Age.
I do understand your point on enabling your son and others who need to evolve. After all, we can't do it alone. Someone needs to continue the race when we fall which is where Goodwill comes in.
But I think there must be some extent of regulations because black market is hugely exploiting this decentralized nature of crypto world.
Communities are supposed to regulate themselves.
So there absolutely is regulation.
Just not the kind people are expecting or even looking for.
Young farts are more irresponsible :))...
I kind of agree with you on this one.
Are you buying the PEPE dip?
I love that pic at the top. It's much like where I grew up.
Regarding a bunch of immortal guys running everything forever, that's kinda how life itself started out. Senescence (aging and dying of old age) had to evolve. Senescence is one of the most vital abilities life has to enable evolution to operate and adapt creatures to changing environments. It's so important that almost no living things do not age out, and dozens of different mechanisms provide that valuable aging service to most species.
IOW, I am absolutely confident no such thing will happen.
A question occurs to me. How would you design a crypto that funded a physical communications network? Not just wires, not just satellites, but something truly decentralized that was distributed across billions of owner operators? I am sure you are aware I believe we are vulnerable without one, and am interested in your thoughts about how it could be achieved.
Thanks!
Wen CB-Radio Coin?
How would you structure the creation of tokens in order to fund manufacture and distribution of CB radios competent to effectively communicate across global expanse? CB radios are of limited range, as are FRS and other extant options for public radio spectrum. The ability of communications within a local community is potential with facility, but even intrastate communications could only be achieved via a mesh network, and that dependent on some form of 24/7 broadcast repeater, since diurnal cycles dramatically impact organic operations.
Continental and trans-oceanic CB transmissions aren't potential. What mechanisms would be necessary, or even possible, to enable CB Coin to create a decentralized network?
Frankly, you have but mocked the very concept of decentralized communications. Given the ongoing censorship of communications media available to the public, this well reflects the consideration you give to the security of your investments.
Easy come, easy go.
When a crypto evolves to the point of nodes being akin to P2P Torrent file sharing (aka Torrent type systems that share and validate randomly distributed blocks across hundreds of thousands computers that run clients), then it will truly be decentralized.
The beginning of your post reminded me about a show I was watching many years ago called "1000 ways to dye" or something like that. It showed both how stupidly and easily we can die but also how fragile life is if we don't care too much about it.
haha yeah that was on purpose :D
I guess I’m part of the impatient ones that are part of the problem, seeing crypto as source of daily bread. I hope to change this as soon as I can.
It's a bit more nuanced than that because most of us here are also drowning in legitimate scarcity.
Hard to be patient when the entire world seems stacked against us.
Deep thinking 😌
it's nuts to think we're just over seven years since Steemit started, and having observed the whole 'decentralization' / crypto movement since... how much slower it's progressed than many hoped, how much of the idealism never quite got traction, seeing evolution/life's own pace playing out in comparison;
that seven years both seems so short and also like lifetimes - though like a drop in the ocean of the larger evolutionary context, almost significant in the larger scope; feels in hindsight like i had my head in the clouds back then, seeing so many of these different topics from a higher vantage point while also totally ungrounded in the dimension of time and all the earthly limitations;
such a contrastive mix of emotions, considering all the different points raised here... seeing the foolishness & futility of the billionaires obsessed with immortality, whose plans could be thwarted in an instant with a solar flare that sends us back to square one with technology; the youthful idealism i once had about "decentralization" while having watched the madness of increased centralization the last three years; all the different polarities of yin & yang amping up;
as cynical & impatient as i've become (if "become" is accurate - could also just be the low point of a long wave that'll come around eventually), it's been cool to hear one of my favorite astrologers, Pam Gregory, consistently emphasize that decentralization is a theme we are steadily moving into/towards evolutionarily; and while all the regulations could be seen on the surface to contradict the OG rebellious philosophies of "decentralization," they're definitely a necessary stepping stone to the type of adoption we've been waiting this seven years for.
good contemplations in here. 🍻